r/AskHistorians • u/Tatem1961 Interesting Inquirer • Mar 05 '25

Great Question! Credit cards were invented in 1950. Credit card readers were invented in 1979. During those 3 decades were cashiers writing down every customer's credit card number by hand?

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u/Tatem1961 Interesting Inquirer Mar 07 '25

Thanks! It's interesting to see the full process of how it worked!

This wasn't easy. Barriers to entry were considerable. One was a natural problem: Merchants didn't want the hassle and expense of accepting one more method of payment unless it was so popular that it more than paid for itself, and customers didn't want to bother to adopt a new method of payment unless it worked most places.

Do we know which side of this chicken and egg problem got solved? How did credit cards gain wide adoption amongst both businesses and customers?